A Bee in the Mouth: Anger in America Now

by Peter Wood

America has gotten into ugly moods before, but never as today. In taking us on a guided tour of American acrimony, Peter Wood traces the roots of anger's triumph in our social and political world. He examines the liberating bromides of psychotherapists, the bellicosity of the war between the sexes, the broadsides of the ethnic separatists, and the jeremiads of fundamentalists of all stripes. A Bee in the Mouth is a provocative dissection of an alarming phenomenon.

Genres: Nonfiction, Politics, History

304 pages, Hardcover

First published January 4, 2007

Reviews

[Lorelei · Rating 1 out of 5]

I don't know where to start. This book had me fuming, not with 'new anger' but at the clear ignorance of the author of history, social trends, and basic human behaviour. I should have made notes as each point was clear in my mind if I wanted to dissect this book properly, but I think it is probably a good that I didn't. He writes that girls being angry about rape are exhibiting 'new anger,' and actually goes so far as to devote an entire chapter to self-storage, as if the ability to put your stuff someplace other than your parent's attic is somehow symptomatic of this 'new anger' which he claims is qualitatively different from any anger that has gone before. The author does make a few good points, probably what kept me reading the book all the way to the end, about the value of restraint when expressing anger, and about claims that expressing our 'new anger,' rage and frustration is somehow empowering. In the end if I could somehow extract the handful of good points made from this travesty of social analysis I might share them with others. As it is, though, I can only recommend that this book be allowed to vanish on the rubbish heap of history.

[Jerry · Rating 1 out of 5]

…one use of the Internet that seems especially prone to New Anger deserves a closer look: the Web log, or blog. A blog is a website diary that can be updated almost instantaneously and linked to other websites.

I tend to agree with the premise of this book, that (a) there is a qualitatively different kind of anger on display now than in the past, that (b) this anger is less about the target of the anger than about acting out anger for the sake of anger, and that (c) this type of New Anger is more prevalent among people who take politics seriously than among those who don’t, and (d) that among those who display this anger, it is more prevalent on the left than on the right.

The problem with the book is that not only does it fail to show why this is so, it fails to show that it’s even true. It meanders around the edges at its best points; most of the time it’s meandering out in the hinterlands, spending several paragraphs or even pages on examples of anger and then saying, but this isn’t the kind of anger we’re talking about, or even, but this isn’t really anger at all. There’s an entire chapter on how the rise of the self-storage industry is fed by the weakening of family ties, that, ultimately, is mainly there to show how atheist anger results in murder.

There’s an attempt to use bees as an analogy throughout the book, but they, also, are mostly an excuse to meander.

While he usually uses the term “New Anger” to describe the anger movement itself, in the first section he also heavily uses “angri-culture” to describe the subculture that encourages acting out anger. Then that term disappears from the book until over halfway through, as if he temporarily gave up on it as too affectatious. The term clearly plays on the word agriculture, but the idea of farming anger appears to not make up any part of how he views the New Anger. There’s a vague sense that some people cultivate this anger, but the analogy is never explicitly made.

There are strange lapses throughout the book, as if his focus on popular culture were perfunctory at best. I found it odd, for example, that of all the movies he references he never references the very influential Network and its “I’m made as hell and I’m not going to take it any more.” (He does mention it in at least one editorial after the book came out.)

Among his musical examples, rap music runs throughout the book. He describes a lot of anger in a lot of musical styles, but usually discounts them as not New Anger after meandering through them. It’s only rap that he keeps referring to as authentic New Anger. But when he talks about how that anger may feed the a violent culture of rap music, he refers to the Notorious B.I.G. as “Notorious Big”.

And even stranger, he repeatedly refers to Hoover Institute scholar Morris P. Fiorina as “Fioina”.

Both of these betray an unfamiliarity with his source material that more reinforces how meandering the arguments are than providing any sort of foundation to his arguments.

The looseness can also be confusing, as when he refers to a 1798 politician as a Republican. Roger Griswold was a Democratic-Republican. Possibly he’s assuming that his reader is familiar enough with 1798 politics to know what he meant, but it’s also possible he wanted to draw a parallel that wasn’t there.

There are interesting insights, such as that part of the reason left talk radio is never successful nationally is that the left cultivates identity politics, which means that there is no market for a generic left entertainment. Black leftists want a Black radio, and “so with other reliably Democratic constituencies.”

Because it was published in 2006 and presumably written over a period before that, he mentions that Democrats often justified their anger by citing the right’s taking accusations of rape against President Clinton seriously. Now that Democrats, too, are beginning to take the accusations seriously, I don’t know if this bolsters or undercuts Wood’s argument, mainly because I’m unclear on what that argument is.

And I had never heard of Happy Bunny, which sounds like it may have been at least part of the inspiration for Alan Moore’s Weeping Gorilla in Promethea, Vol. 1.

Despite his focus on New Anger in politics, there is nothing here about how the nationalization of political power feeds a national culture of New Anger, by nationalizing what would otherwise be regional disputes or not disputes at all. Such a theory would of course feed into the agricultural angri-culture analogy he doesn’t make.

Nor is there anything about how the Internet allows people to band together to find people who are similarly angry. He comes up to the edge of realizing that the Internet allows people with specialized interests to find each other, but does not seem to connect this with the rise of a New Anger. On the one hand this could mean that the Internet provides an angri-cultural hothouse for the cultivation of New Anger; but it might also mean that New Anger is actually very rare, and only appears common because the Internet provides a fertile field for the angry few to find people with similar angers.

Country is the least angry of the currently popular music genres in the United States. It has nothing of hip-hop’s pervasive angry sound and vituperative lyrics, and unlike the rock ’n’ roll supermarket with special angry sections in aisles four and six, country music has no subgenera that are devoted to alienation and anger. The closest is comes is a short-lived movement during the 1970s called “Outlaw,” which began when singers Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson rebelled against the Nashville establishment. They rejected the increasingly pop sound of Nashville and combined elements of rock with older folk traditions. They also adopted a lifestyle conspicuous for hard drinking and drug use. Sometimes an Outlaw song could be angry. Perhaps the best-known song of that sort was Johnny Paycheck’s 1977 hit recording of David Allan Coe’s “Take This Job and Shove It”…

[Zechy · Rating 2 out of 5]

An anthropologist trying not to write like an anthropologist, the metaphors are strained, the narrative is disjunct, and it doesn't come to a satisfying conclusion.

[Paul Sand · Rating 4 out of 5]

[Imported automatically from my blog. Some formatting there may not have translated here.]

This book by Peter Wood is an attempt to explore a question much on America's mind of late: why the heck are these people so pissed off all the time? Wood's thesis is that today's anger is a different species from what we've seen boefore. The "new anger" is an emotion that's all about the celebration of oneself: it's self-righteous, and often its primary purpose is it's own display. In a word, tedious. But nonetheless a topic worth checking out.

Wood investigates just about all relevant facets of our culture, driving up and down the entire length of American history. Some are expected: popular music, movies, politics, and (important for us narcissists) the blogosphere. But there are lengthy digressions into unexpected territory, most notably the sociology of self-service storage.

In short, it's great fun. Wood's style is accessible and appropriately light; it wouldn't do to get angry about the upsurge of anger in America, after all.

I'll quibble, however: if you're going to delve into movie anger, you need to have Sidney Lumet in your index, not George Lucas. Lumet's oeuvre includes 12 Angry Men and Network, both angry classics, the latter with perhaps the archetypical angry guy, Howard Beale, ranting "I'm mad as hell, … and I'm not going to take this any more!."

And, while musing on pop music, Wood does mention Elvis Costello. But inexplicably fails to quote:

Oh, I used to be disgusted
And now I try to be amused.

But those really are just quibbles. Wood's book is a good read, and you'll learn interesting things along the way. And if it makes you less angry, all the better.

[The American Conservative]

'A Bee in the Mouth is a thoughtful, disturbing, and well-written book that examines what too many Americans have become: inarticulate on-line furies incapable of venturing beyond the S-word, the F-word, and their lists of everyone and everything that sucks. Too shallow to match the towering rage of Lear or the baleful imprecations of Achilles, they indulge in the sputtering, foot-stamping tantrums of Rumpelstiltskin.'

Read the Full Review, "Angri-cultural Revolution," on our website:
http://www.theamericanconservative.co...

[Lauren]

I'm still reading, but this book is pretty eye-opening about how many forms of anger are out there now. Especially how we dictate it in our everyday lives and how the idea of anger has taken shape to mean power and assertiveness, and other positive qualities.

It's non-fiction, and not a pop-up or picture book, so not for the faint of heart!

[Bryan · Rating 5 out of 5]

About time; something that disects the vitriol pervasive in American politics and culture. Unfortunate the author could not shed his conservative views to argue the point critically.